


Doll Parts

by speccygeekgrrl



Category: Fringe
Genre: F/M, kink bingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-10-05
Updated: 2009-10-05
Packaged: 2017-10-02 12:32:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speccygeekgrrl/pseuds/speccygeekgrrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>William brings Nina home after her arm's amputation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doll Parts

**Author's Note:**

> Written for kink_bingo, prompt "amputee fetishism." This isn't precisely that.

"Nina." The anaesthetic should have worn off by now; William is certain that the only reason Nina Sharp still sleeps is because she likes to defy his expectations. "Nina, wake up," he urges quietly, fingers tracing her cheek with the pale excuse of pushing away her already-pinned-back hair. She murmurs wordlessly, lips barely moving, but she turns into his touch and that's a sure enough sign that she'll listen now. "Wake up so I can fix you, my beautiful broken doll."

"Hate that," her first distinct words are a dry whisper, "_hate_ when you call me doll," and he laughs before her green eyes open. "William..."

Under the hospital sheet, what remains of her arm moves, and her gaze falls and stops. He can read the sudden despair on her face as if it were his own handwriting-- and in a way, his was the signature on the doctor's order, his suggestion that she get checked out and his urging the reason the cancer was discovered-- and before she can pretend to brush it away, he cups her cheek in one broad hand.

"I can't promise I won't call you it any more," he says, low and intent, "but I can promise that you'll be as good as new by this time next week. All we have to do is set the calibrations on the bionic limb--"

"Don't make me any promises," she cuts him off, lips twisted in a not-quite-smile, "just get me a drink of water, could you? I asked them not to use morphine, it leaves me so parched." Even half-insensate from painkillers, she can shut him up with one good look, and he keeps to himself all he was going to say; her pale lips purse around the straw he offers and he tries not to tell her that what she's lost he's going to replace with something better, that no matter what she has taken from her, he'll give her so much more in return.

No, all he says is, "I'll speak to the doctors about it," relinquishing the paper cup to her left hand when she reaches for it.

"Thank you. I want to leave as soon as possible." Her right arm moves again, a gesture gone unsketched with no hand to carry out the nonverbal cue, and Nina's lips tighten briefly. "William, what does it-- how does it look?" The vulnerability in her voice shouldn't be there, should _never_ be any part of Nina Sharp, and the first thing he does after standing up is lean over her and kiss her cheek gently.

"It doesn't matter, Nina. No one will be able to tell, soon enough." His lips brush over hers in the barest contact, and he straightens, looking every inch the scientist except for the warmth in his brown eyes. "Let me handle the details, and I'll have you home tonight." He pauses in the doorway until she nods consent, then offers her a quick smile before setting out to take care of liberating her from the hospital room.

\--

Her always-slight body is unbalanced in his arms, now; as many times as William held her in the past, walking Nina up to her own apartment now is viscerally different in so many ways, the least of which is his responsibility to unlock the door now. She doesn't complain-- she wouldn't, it's not in her prickly and proud nature to complain about what can't be helped-- but he can hear every annoyed little intake of breath when she starts to do something and only eight inches of upper arm respond instead of the entire limb she still expects, and it's a frequent sound.

"Do you want to rest tomorrow?" he asks, and the glare she aims at him is enough to make him backpedal verbally, "I'm not implying that you're weakened, Nina!"

"No, I don't need any down time, I want to start with the calibrations immediately. I still don't see why we couldn't have gone to the labs directly, even if there's no one working now, you _are_ the owner of the entire company, and the scientist in charge of the project..." She closes her bedroom door sharply, leaving him on the opposite side of it.

"Don't give in to hyperbole, my love. You know precisely why I can't do all of the work myself," he answers dryly, "and you know that if I could, we'd be there right now." She doesn't answer him for long enough that he frowns, leaning against the wall by the door. "Are you mad at me?"

"Not at _you_, no." There's a thump and a quiet curse on the other side of the door, and when it swings open, William is met with the sight of his lover near tears, half-undressed not in a provocative fashion but a this-far-and-no-further way. "I can't-- between this--" she waves her left hand at her right side-- "and the painkillers and the _frustration_, god, William, I could scream if it would do any good."

"Oh, Nina." She falls against his chest when he pulls her closer, and he holds her wordlessly for a few minutes, letting her relax at her own pace, until she's ready. "Are you all right?"

"No, I'm a mess," she shoots back, pressing her face into the crook of his neck. "What if it doesn't work, William, what if this bionic arm doesn't do what you keep promising it will? Even if it does, when you look at me are you going to see _me_ or just another subject attached to one of your inventions?" She stills, holding her breath and her position in statue-perfect motionlessness, and finally there's something William can respond to truthfully.

"Never. I will never see you as anything but who you are, Nina, regardless of how you look or whether you're part cyborg or how much you might hate me, I can only ever see that you're brilliant and beautiful." In his arms she shivers, and he strokes a hand up and down her back slowly, unhooking the bra she hadn't managed on her own just to draw his fingers unhindered along her spine. "And if it doesn't work, I understand if you will hate me. But it will work, I promise. If it doesn't work now, I won't rest until it _does_."

"Don't be stupid," she mutters, lifting her head from his shoulder to meet his eyes finally, "as if I could hate you, ridiculous man."

"As if I could do anything but love you, my stubborn contrary doll." She makes a sound of indignation that's easily silenced with his lips on hers, and again he can't help but feel the way her slim body is unbalanced in his grasp, so easily lifted and so gently set down on her bed.

He undresses her with care, kisses quieting them both from questions without answers and reassurances without basis in reality; she watches his face for a hint of disgust that never comes while he touches her, kissing both her shoulders, showing the same interest to both sides of her body as ever before. He whispers her name into the flatness of her belly and the hollow of her hips, traces his tongue over the contours of familiar flesh, writes his promises into her body until she cries his name like a prayer or a curse.

She falls asleep before he does, overtaken by the strain of surgery, the lassitude of good painkillers and the final nudge of postcoital hormones; for a long time, William holds Nina close, his arm around her waist and his chin tucked over her shoulder, and contemplates the place where metal and synthetics will bond to flesh and nerves, where hopefully the modern miracles of technology will quickly give Nina back what cancer has stolen from her-- where his work will make perfect what nature destroyed, perhaps.

They won't know for sure until the morning. This is the first night William finds it difficult to sleep with Nina in his arms.


End file.
